


Of Sanity and Misfortune

by orphan_account



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, Blood, Drugs, Fortune Teller Bill, Human Bill Cipher, M/M, Medical Trauma, Mild Gore, Physical Abuse, Sex, Sexual Content, Sexual innuendos, Slavery, Slow Burn, Verbal Abuse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-16
Updated: 2016-03-21
Packaged: 2018-05-25 14:14:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6198209
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bill Cipher was a man of many mysteries, a demon in human skin. At least that's what Dipper thought when coming upon a man who claimed to know of the future of those around them.</p><p>He would be lying through his teeth if he said the fortune teller hadn’t piqued his interest.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Where The Dull of Night Finds The Sun

**Author's Note:**

> *This fiction is loosely based on [this](http://mikanchan-popipo.tumblr.com/post/140549431573/okay-so-i-have-this-idea-of-a-billdip-gypsy-au) post by [mikanchan-popipo](http://mikanchan-popipo.tumblr.com/) on tumblr
> 
> *Also I am aware the phrase "gypsy" is considered a slur for the Romani, though due to the timeline in which this is written they will be referred to as such in some cases only to be accurate. (The time itself takes place in the 1800's and I do apologize for using the slur, but it won't be often used!)

Paris. He never really found the allure of it if he were being honest, but the constant smell of pastries and coffee beans that lingered in the air gave some semblance of comfort if not wake him up just a fraction. The atmosphere though foggy and usually cast in the dark clouds seemed far brighter than it had in the past month, like the soothing calm before a storm. 

Dipper Pines more or less ignored those around him, papers stained in ink within his grasp and taking up most of his line of sight as he padded along the cobblestone under his heels. He’d been practicing his french as the papers suggested, only simple things to help him get by like ‘thank you’ or ‘have a nice day’. Simple things, he told himself, no matter how much he butchered the beautiful language with his pronunciation. 

His sister Mabel, being the ecstatic and expository woman that she was, insisted that he learn things such as this if they were to be here for a while working alongside their great uncle Stan, or ‘grunkle’ as Dipper’s sibling insisted he be called. Unlike himself however, not once had she pronounced a single word of french incompetently since taking residence with their...grunkle, having mastered it immediately as though she was born speaking it to begin with. 

She was far more eager to learn and that came as no surprise to Dipper. He kept to his studies well enough, his mathematical skills impeccable and mind swimming with imagination. The grip he had on the papers tightened as he brought it before his tired gaze, neatly scrawled french written in Mabel’s delicate hand.

“Comment puis-je vous aider aujourd'hui?” he muttered, narrowing his eyes. Written down it looked lovely albeit sounded horrendous coming out of Dipper’s mouth.

He frowned and scanned over the paper before coming upon a phrase without a translation.  _ Vous devez pratiquer votre français _ ! A few words looked familiar though Dipper found himself standing in front of a pastry shop with a disgusted look on his face. Suffice to say the older woman setting out her warm croissants and éclairs gave him a confused look as he was facing her baked goods while mulling over the phrase in his head with a vague sneer. Dipper glanced up to find her face scrunched up, cheeks rosy and plump figure slightly cocked with a hand on her hip in acrimony. 

The brunette could only bring himself to smile sheepishly with a blush dusting his cheeks, followed by turning on his heel and marching away with renewed and slightly embarrassing vigor. The phrase he couldn’t decipher now only lingered in the back of his mind for a few moments before dissipating, his focus returning to the other words as he all but buried his face in the layers of parchment.

“Bienvenue.” The word slipped off his tongue easily enough, not sounding so horribly mangled.  _ Welcome  _ was scribbled next to it in faded ink, revealing just how long he’d had the crumpled paper in his possession since Mabel gave it to him...a few months at the very least.

Dipper slowed his pace, relishing in the darkness of an early morning. Regardless of the blooming headache at the back of his skull due to his rigorous effort in learning french, contentment crawled into his chest. The young man took a deep breathe, air filling his lungs with a faint hint of sweetness that always seemed to linger. 

“Frère!”

The  debility in which a feminine voice called out grabbed Dipper’s attention almost immediately albeit he stiffened when he realized  _ brother  _ is what had flittered through the air. He stuffed the papers in his fingers in his tailcoat, close to his chest and barely peeking out from behind the deep azure fabric. He’d only vaguely turned when a petite frame collided awkwardly against his side in a hug. 

Mabel looked up at him in absolute delight, her bright eyes squinting in mirth and framed lightly by the curls of soft cocoa that made up her hair. The messy pile of waves and twists was distracting if anything else, so much so that it screamed Mabel to the heavens.

Dipper furrowed his brows, arm itching to rub at the back of his neck as he looked upon his sisters expectant gaze. “Ah...sœur…?”

A laugh slipped past his siblings red stained lips, her body straightening to greet him “properly” as some called it. “Right on the mark!” She paused, gaze fluttering to the parchment in his coat before she reached her porcelain hand out to pluck the papers from him. He gave little protest as she read it over with a raised brow. “You  _ still _ have this?”

“W-Well...yeah?” His voice cracked slightly, forcing him to cough into his hand. “Just in case I forget something.”

Mabel hummed, her fingertips tapping the paper. “Vous êtes si bête, Dip.”

He huffed in response. “And what does that mean?”

A small smile pulled at the woman’s previously pursed lips before she shoved the paper against his chest. “If you bothered to learn french than you'd know,” she teased, a gentle flurry of laughter bubbling from her throat.

“I guess that's fair.”

“It is! But-” Mabel’s voice cut off as she reached her fingers into the confines of her floral bodice, her teeth nipping at her bottom lip in concentration.

Dipper gawked at her shameless display, albeit swiftly closed his gaping jaw with a pop and placed his crinkled papers back into the confines of his coat. This was Mabel, and he expected nothing less of her however odd and outrageous it was. His eyes darted around warily during the…“show”. To his fortune no one of significance, or anyone at all really, strode into the brunette’s line of sight. He flittered his hesitant sight to his siblings face just as she looked back up, a finely folded piece of paper in between her fore and middle finger.

She waved the small parchment before his eyes. “Know what this is?”

A shrug of indifference settled in Dipper’s shoulders. “A piece of paper…?”

“Well, technically yes, but-!” Mabel’s voice briefly cut off, her hands making quick work of unfolding the paper and presenting it. “These have been posted all around Notre Dame lately! Look!”

Before his gaze was an affiche, weathered and faded from the elements with a slight yellow tinged border that may have once been white. Creases littered the surface from being folded multiple times and no doubt having stayed in Mabel’s bodice for a majority of the morning. Faint disgust ran up his spine in the form of chills as he took the warm parchment in his hands.

The image itself was of two hands, worn and caramel in color. The fingers were poised in such a way that they mirrored each other perfectly save for the faint etching of an eye on the back of the right hand from Dipper’s perspective. His gaze further examined the digits of the hands, thumb and forefingers pressed together in an upside-down triangular shape, the dark line of a circle around it. A drawn banner poked out beneath it, “Ghicitoare” written in a thick and curled typeface.

Dipper parted his lips, his tongue darting out to wet them as he examined the parchment. “What does…‘ghicitoare’ mean?”

“Out of all of  _ that _ -” Mabel’s hands proceeded to grab at the paper and wiggle it around haphazardly for emphasis. “You only noticed ‘ghicitoare’? Not whose hands those are?”

His curiosity  _ may  _ have been piqued, but that didn't mean he was going to ignore the finely written words glaring at him.

“Is it french?” Dipper asked, brushing off Mabel’s comments on his questioning.

She pulled the paper away from him with ease, her doe eyes studying each curl and dot of ink. “It’s romanian and…” Her voice briefly trailed off, a smile pulling at either end of her lips. “It means ‘fortune teller’.”

“So, what...you want to go see a fortune teller?” It wasn’t necessarily hard to believe. The siblings  _ do  _ run a shop of oddities, and a fortune teller was from the things Dipper encountered on a daily basis.

Mabel began to fold the piece of paper up. “Obviously! How often does a fortune teller run into Paris huh?” The parchment found itself being shoved back into the floral bodice with little to no care.

Dipper raised his hand to press into the back of his neck, fingers playing with the hair there. “Where are they going to be and what time?”

“Cathedral courtyard, around noon.”

His fingers trailed up his neck until Dipper was defeatedly pinching at the bridge of his nose. Judging by the poster of sorts it was a free reading, and there was seemingly no harm in getting a quick reading from  _ one  _ person. Besides, the courtyard was a large area in itself so it wouldn’t be hard to miss. It’d be akin to going in and out within a few minutes.

Dipper dropped his hand to his side and eyed Mabel warily. “Alright.”

A deafening squeal slipped from behind the siblings lips, her feet tapping excitedly on the ground with faint clicks. “Yes!” Mabel turned on her heel and began a quick pace away from him. “Meet me at the shop when you can! I’m going to pick up a new outfit!”

“What? Why!” He took after her for a few steps, giving up when she made no movement to acknowledge him. 

The brunette more or less grumbled to himself, stiffly holding his hands at his sides. He was already heading to the shop to begin with, and simply continued on his path. The hands from that poster were thoroughly etched into his mind. To say the least, his curiosity was inflating with each passing moment even though the underlining of ‘fortune teller’ being written in romanian made him suspicious.

He himself hadn't notice any posters lining the city, though he  _ did  _ keep mostly to himself within the confines of the shop. Dipper sighed and kept walking at a leisurely pace that some might call slow, but with the gentle breeze running its airy fingers through his hair he didn't find the need to rush. The streets of Paris were empty and descelate in such a way that he might call it abandoned. 

Dipper lost track of his footsteps, unknowingly entering the Notre Dame cathedral’s courtyard. The thoughts running through his cool mind kept him distracted, save for the soft tunes of music that pulled him from them. When Dipper glanced up, his body involuntarily stiffened. 

Caravans lined the courtyard, each of them intricately designed in patterns painted and carved on each colorful carriage. It was a vast contrast compared to the dull colors of the cobblestone and dark skies, a black and white painting splattered with flecks of color. Dipper’s lips parted in awe as he looked around, refraining from venturing further into the small groups of people setting up tents and draping various items on racks.

It was like nothing he’d ever seen before. Few women wore tight corsets, the sleeves of their outfits flowing and skirts hanging above their finely decorated ankles. Out of the amount of men that he saw, they wore slacks that hugged their legs comfortably. Most of them were carrying around crates or talking animatedly with the women and the very few children that sat on the steps of caravans with colorful cloth draped over their small frames. Never had he seen such an innocent and intriguing sight, the small group of people singing and dancing around one another furthering the purity of it.

Despite all the commotion however, one caravan had particularly caught his attention, closest to the cathedral. Dipper’s feet carried him along the perimeter of the courtyard until he was peeking from behind a maroon archway of a caravan to the one that demanded the utmost attention of them all. Each and every inch of it was stained in charcoal, a color of the night before his very eyes. What had the brunette staring with his mouth agape was the hand painted symbols and designs in a fine gold paint that just barely caught the sunlight poking out from the dark clouds above.

“Something interesting, sapling?”

Dipper jumped, whipping his head over his shoulder. The ivory cravat along his neck bit at his skin as he examined the man who looked down at him in slight amusement. With what little light from the sky at the man’s back, he was bathed in a shadow that was more than intimidating. A chill crept along Dipper’s spine as he stood taller and faced the man, his eyes however boring into the ground.

“The uh...caravan. I-I just wanted to get a better look at it…” he trailed off, gaze studying the man’s hands intently. He held in a gasp when he noticed a single eye inked into his left hand, rings of aurelian littering his fingers.

The man's head briefly turned to the object of discussion before fixating back onto Dipper. “And why is that?”

His palms grew clammy at the near threatening tone addressing him, a hint of general curiosity slipping into the question. The brunette let out a shaky breath, lifting his hand to point to what he hoped was the thick coating of paint that lined the door of the caravan.

“The gold paint is...it’s…” Dipper trailed off, frustrated with himself that he couldn't pick out the words he wished. He huffed and dropped his hand in favor of clenching it at his side. “I've never...seen anything like it. It's just beautiful.” The words came out almost breathlessly, dull eyes staring longingly into each swirl and faint glitter of the aurelian paint.

“Prostie copăcel.”

Dipper’s eyes flickered back to the man. “What...what does that mean?”

A single halcyon eye squinted, though it could’ve been the lighting giving it the peculiar color. His entire demeanor seemed to change within a matter of seconds.

“Nothing you need to worry about, kid!” The man shrugged with a sterling smile widening along his darkly hued skin, although the movement only lasted a fracture of a second before the man held his right and inkless hand out. “The names Cipher, but  _ you _ little sapling can call me Bill.”

The young man couldn’t help but notice the various sizes of x’s running up Bill’s forearm in the form of scars, disappearing into the two thin and thick charcoal lines around his bicep. The shadow of the caravan hid anything else he might’ve seen of the man’s arm.

Dipper swallowed hard, taking the hand before him. “Dipper.”

Bill’s grip tightened just a fraction. “Dipper, huh?”

A blush pinched at his cheeks before he pulled his hand away. “Y-Yeah. It’s just a stupid nickname that-”

“Kid…” Bill began, lazily draping his arm over Dipper’s shoulder to pull him close. “With a name like that, you’d fit in pretty good around here.”

His brows furrowed, and he turned his head to question the man when he took pause. A thin and dirtied amber hued cloth was tightly wrapped around Bill’s head and pulled down where his right eye would be, blonde fibers of hair poking out and brushing over his nose and sharply arched dark eyebrow. 

A lump accumulated deep in Dipper’s throat. “I...I uh-”

The boy was quickly released, a musical laugh seeping from Bill’s lips as he held onto Dipper’s shoulder. “Lighten up, sapling! It’s not like I’m a  _ threat  _ to your existence.”

Confusion contorted Dipper’s face, his body easily slipping away from the blonde. “I-I never said…” he trailed off, an eyebrow raised incredulously.

A hand returned to his shoulder, far more firm in its grip than before. “You didn’t have to. I know your insides are just twisting aren't they?” Bill's voice came out soft, an inch away from a whisper that tickled at the shell of Dipper’s ear.

“Out of curiosity maybe.” He had hoped his voice came out calm and collected, but was disappointed when it seeped past his lips in a broken statement.

Bill hummed, his fingers tapping against the young man's shoulder with the accompanied sound of his rings clicking against one another. “I think I’m gonna like you, kid.”

Dipper flinched. “I…but.. ” He couldn't put together a proper response that would suffice, and settled his attention to the ache blooming against his shoulder.

The other man's posture straightened suddenly, his arms held behind his back and abandoning the brunette’s shoulder. The regal stature in which Bill stood looked odd on the lazily dressed man and any delight simply vanished from his face. “You should get going, sapling.”

The faintly shorter man nodded, taking a few steps away before glancing over his shoulder to find Bill Cipher watching him intently. With the new lighting, Dipper stared at the man’s face. His jawline was sharp and lined with stubble relative to the color of his hairs dark roots, few strands brushing against his high cheekbones.

Dipper blinked, cheeks flushing out of embarrassment.  “Will you be here around noon?”

The man smirked. “I think you already know, kid.” 

He proceeded to turn away, waving his inked hand behind him as he disappeared from view and left Dipper to his own devices to which the brunette walked away. His footfalls had never been so eager to leave.


	2. Glittering Mud

Out of all the years of life he'd been graced with, never had Dipper Pines marched quicker than he had in that moment. His footfalls were calculated, angry almost if not just a small fraction. His thoughts absentmindedly strayed from Cipher and onto his sibling. Mabel failed to inform him that he’d agreed to practically attend a gathering of massive and colorful proportions. Everything was piecing together, to the romanian on that damned poster and just the essence that oozed from the now crowded cathedral courtyard.

They were Gypsies, or travelers. He wasn’t exactly sure of what term they referred to themselves as, but it had his mind reeling. Dipper would be lying through his teeth if he said fortune teller hadn’t piqued his interest. The odd man had a voice that was hard to forget, a face even harder to do so. The unnerving smile that was near permanently etched into the man’s face had burned an unwelcome image into his mind, like he was being taunted from afar.

He hissed quietly to himself, fingers relentlessly running through his unruly curls of hair as he came upon a weathered shop. The sign hanging above was aged, the red lettering of “Pine’s Peculiarities” faded to an extent where one would have to squint to make out the words and fill in the seemingly missing letters. Dipper took a moment to glare at the sign before stepping through the threshold with a familiar ring of a bell above his head.

Mabel was behind the counter, her outfit agonizingly resembling that of the women he saw earlier. She glanced up to him with a toothy grin and arms propped on the counter. “Hey Dip!”

He suppressed a leer, casually leaning across from her. Splinters poked at his sleeves uncomfortably. “So, I passed by the cathedral just a few moments ago.”

The sibling hummed, soft gaze averting to a particular scorch mark etched into the poorly stained wood at her elbows. “Oh…?” 

Dipper nodded in mock excitement. “Yeah.”

“And…” Mabel prompted, cautiously making eye contact with the neutral mask replacing Dipper’s usually aloof expression.

“The fortune teller was interesting enough.” It wasn’t necessarily a lie.

“You met him?” Mabel immediately perked up, her body awkwardly leaning over the counter as she gripped at Dipper’s shoulders desperately. “What’d you talk about? Did he read your palm? Reveal the day of your death?” 

The young man contained his stoic features. “I never said the fortune teller was a ‘he’, Mabel.” Though the poster could’ve easily justified that, but posters are mostly for show anyway.

Mabel’s face paled considerably, fingers releasing their tight hold on Dipper’s coat. “Oh, right…”

“Mabel…”

The woman held up her arms in surrender, a nervous laugh tumbling from her lips. “Right, so he may have been here for a few days already...and I might have got a reading already,” she muttered quickly.

Dipper sighed and couldn’t help but pinch at the bridge of his nose. “If you already got a reading then why-” He paused, hand quickly dropping as he glared up. “You wanted me to get a reading didn’t you?”

“Isn’t he so...interesting to look at?” Mabel’s cheeks flushed, her hands touching the warm flesh in a daze while she pointedly ignored his question. 

He groaned. Sure, the mysterious Bill Cipher may be considered a sight for sore eyes to some, but the man left an unsettling chill to curl in Dipper’s stomach. There was something about him that clearly wasn’t right, fortune teller or not. It sounded like a mystery Dipper wouldn’t mind solving, and he found himself looking past Mabel and the oddities spread along the counter to the grandfather clock flush against the wall. Noon would assert itself officially within the next half hour. The young man looked back to his sister.

“We have a half hour to spare,” he stated simply, lifting himself from the crooked wood under his weight and walking further into the shop. A shrunken and shriveled head lazily hanging from a shelf made him cringe.

“Wait, so we can still go?” Mabel’s voice was calm, cautious even as she made her way around the counter and to Dipper’s side. Her hands were held tight together in front of her. “You won't mind getting a reading from Cipher? And you're okay with the others?”

He figured ‘others’ referred to the people scuttering about the courtyard and nodded, tilting his head to Mabel in acknowledgement. “Well, he seems like a mystery so of course I have to solve it, right?” Dipper smiled to his sibling softly. “Besides, there hasn't been a lot of chances for us to spend some time together.” 

In the short moment that his sister hadn't responded, Dipper wondered if Bill had told Mabel of his name beside Cipher. Then again, maybe she simply chose not to say it. ‘Cipher’ was an intriguing name, fitting for one dealing with the future of those seeking little glimpses of what was in store for them. It was simple to say, slipping off the tongue easily in two elegant syllables. Just as the line of thought occurred, a tug on his coat forced him from it.

Mabel was donning a slightly annoyed look, but it vanished just as quickly as it appeared. “So, what do we do for the next half hour, Dip?”

“Maybe we could…” He trailed off and pondered the question. In all honesty, Dipper hadn't the slightest clue as to what could pass the time. His teeth bit at his lip.

“We could head to the bakery!” Mabel suggested, the soft taps of her feet already heading to the door.

Dipper nodded hesitantly, the events of earlier that morning creeping into his mind. He shuddered as the rather grumpy woman resurfaced from the back of his mind and hoped she didn’t recognize him. The young man was anxious though he quietly followed his sister from the shop and into the streets. The once empty city was now littered with residents in their fresh attire, carriages sliding past the siblings and the faint sound of clicking against cobblestone. 

Mabel all but skipped ahead of him happily in her flowing ensemble. The skirt that hung above her bare feet and ankles was a deep charcoal with various eyes stitched into it in ivory thread, identical to the eye staining the back of Cipher’s hand. The sight was disconcerting in itself, each eye watching Dipper wherever he went.

He quickened his pace behind Mabel, dragging his sight away from her. To his luck, the woman was leading him along a path away from the Notre Dame courtyard and through various back roads and alleys framed with crooked walls, constantly damp from the poor weather. The young man sneered as he caught a glimpse of Mabel running through puddles of mud and waste in her pale feet, uncaring of the mud staining her skin and glittering anklets. Dipper parted his lips to question her antics when his boot sunk into a deep puddle of mud.

The sickening sound of suction caused Mabel to turn, her cheeks puffing up as she held in a childish giggle. “Need some help?”

Dipper snorted. “No! Just, hang on a minute,” he said gruffly, hopping forward on his other foot and tugging at his imprisoned leg. The mud seemed only to encase his hessian boot further, refusing to release him. “It won’t...budge!”

The giggly sibling stepped forward, grabbing at the man's wrist and pulling with as much strength as she could muster. “Geez!” Mabel stumbled backward, almost losing her footing as she went. Her eyes narrowed at the puddle sucking at Dipper’s calf. “We might need some help here…”

“Poate că ar putea fi de ajutor?” The brunette’s looked up, an old woman watching them in amusement with her hands held in front of her in the utmost innocent pose. The siblings faces scrunched, mulling over her words until she spoke up again. “I am offering my help.”

Mabel then smiled brightly, rushing to the woman's side. “My brother is stuck in the mud,” she explained.

The man raised a brow. Wasn’t that obvious? He watched his sister lead the woman over, his throat humming as he kept silent. The old woman was barely the height of Mabel’s shoulder, her frame small and littered with age. Upon closer inspection, her gaze held milky iris’ that darted in Dipper’s general direction. Guilt pinched at his expression, contorted it into a state of melancholy. No wonder Mabel helped her to his slowly sinking form.

Her head tilted up to him, thick silvery curls framing her rather round and terra-cotta hued face. “What’s your name, boy?”

“Uh...Dipper,” he muttered.

“Nadya,” she quipped in a thick and pleasant accent, leaning down and poking at his leg with a shaky finger. “Relax your leg dear.”

Dipper shifted around the mud to stand tall and put more weight onto his right leg. “Like that?” He looked up to find Mabel giving him a thumbs up.

Nadya hummed in approval, a tune vibrating behind her teeth. Her weathered and decorated fingers grabbed the lowest of his leg closest to the mud and gently tugged. With little to no effort, Dipper’s boot slid free of the puddle. She stood as he shook the thick substance from his leg.

“Children,” she began, catching both of the siblings attention. “Now that I’ve help you two, would you help a blind bat find her way to the cathedral?”

Beside him, Mabel giggled. He promptly swatted her arm and smiled down to the weathered woman. “We were going there anyway.” Surely it was almost noon, and to be agonizingly honest Dipper hadn't be overly thrilled on visiting the bakery.

Nadya’s eyes glittered faintly as the siblings linked their arms with her own and headed out of the alley. Dipper cautiously watched his feet just in case. The various puddles and piles of waste scattered among the alley quickly lessened. The woman at his side held onto his arm tightly, and he admitted that he was curious whether or not she ever had sight. There was no signs of her old age being the culprit, her eyes rather unique and holding a spark of a child at heart. He licked his cold lips, allowing the low mumbles of the women to grace his eardrums.

Mabel idly chatted with the small woman about anything that came to mind in that moment. The old woman answered in kind and for that Dipper was grateful, and the rather domestic conversation gave the young man a few moments to study Nadya warily.

A thick wool scarf of crimson color hung off her shoulders lazily, the fabric nearly touching the back of her legs. The cloth contrasted nicely against her skin tone, almost even bringing out the color of the various jewels adorning the rings on her frail fingers. He blinked in surprise when she looked to him, her grip tightening on the crook of his elbow.

“You and your twin are going to see Cipher, correct?” she said simply, a single strand of ivory hair falling against the bridge of her nose.

Dipper’s eyes widened. “Uh...yes, but how do you know her and I are-”

Nadya pulled her other arm from Mabel to pat his hand with the affection of a grandmother. “You both are two sides of the same coin.” She paused, a strained laugh leaving the confines of her throat. “And your sister told me as much.”

He groaned. “Right.”

“But be wary, child.” Nadya’s voice was barely a whisper that held a foreboding tone. She knew Mabel couldn't hear her and used it to her advantage as she addressed Dipper.

The brunette furrowed his brows. “Why?”

Silence held stiffly in the air before the old woman looked ahead. “I'm sure the man won't do you any harm, but have no ill will toward him should your future be dark.”

Dipper held his tongue after that, focusing his sight onto the familiar cobblestone under his feet. A dark future? The thought was intriguing at best, and worrisome at worst. He had never really thought of what his future might entail save for the times when he was a child and wished to see the world and all the monsters in it if there were any. The closest he had ever got to such was seeing his grunkle in the early hours of the morning. A shiver went up his spine as the memory flowed freely behind his eyes.

Dipper glanced back up, Mabel just ahead of himself and Nadya. “What else can you tell me of...Cipher?” he asked softly, almost tempted to call him Bill though suppressed the urge.

Nadya hummed in thought, her frail and delicate fingers thumbing a heavy gold earring. “Not much to tell of the man.” She looked up to Dipper suddenly. “Dipper, did you say? Are you aware of why I must go to the cathedral?”

He nodded. “It hardly matters, you helped me so...it's the right thing to do to help you in return.”

The old woman smiled. “Very well. Cipher came to my family at a young age, no family to speak of. Always a strange lad, but had a special...talent for-”

“Fortune telling?” Dipper interrupted, his gaze fully engrossed on the woman.

Nadya answered by swatting the side of his head. “Don't interrupt a woman while she's speaking! At my age I don't have a minute to spare!”

The brunette hissed as the woman's rings caught his ear, turning the skin pink. “Sorry...ma’am.”

“Nadya is fine dear, but to answer your question, yes.” She proceeded to pat the side of Dipper’s head. “But...if you'd want to hear more of the man in question I'd ask him yourself.”

Dipper raised a brow as the aged woman grew quiet, her gaze following the soft and languid steps of his sibling.

He’d take her suggestion into consideration.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I adore writing old women like Nadya 
> 
> Also I hope you enjoyed the chapter!

**Author's Note:**

> "Comment puis-je vous aider aujourd'hui?" How can I help you today?  
> "Vous devez pratiquer votre français!" You have to practice your French!  
> "Sœur" Sister  
> -  
> "Prostie copăcel." Silly sapling.
> 
> * [ Mabel Hair Reference](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/X72_1cOARX8/maxresdefault.jpg) (I feel like I didn't do it much justice describing it)


End file.
